Cambridge – Thirsty
[NB, I’ve visited again and it remains excellent]
This was the second pub in the little expedition that my friend Nathan and I took ourselves on in Cambridge on Saturday (the first was JD Wetherspoon for a quick breakfast) and it was apparent quite quickly that this was going to be an early highlight of the day.
That’s a very decadent and exciting selection of beers chalked up above the bar. The service was friendly, engaging and the staff member was knowledgeable and keen to help.
Functional seating in a venue which seemed to have started with more of a wine emphasis and has shifted more towards craft beer, a move that I applaud. There were lots of power points around the bar as well which was handy. They’re partly a shop and partly a bar which is a nice combination, although we noticed them on Untappd, which shows that it’s perhaps worth venues like this paying for the premium service to get noticed…. It’s not the largest venue around, but there is a reasonable amount of seating and there are a few seats outside as well for when it’s warmer.
The beer selection in the fridges, which cut across numerous styles and the choices here were no less decadent than the draft options.
The Sweet Cherry Bakewell Sour from Vault City Brewing, nice flavours of cherries and almonds, although I probably didn’t need as much as half a pint of it.
The Blueberry Pumpkin Spice Latte, again from the ever reliable Vault City Brewing. Smooth, full bodied with an initial hit of blueberries and then a rich aftertaste of cinnamon and more blueberries. Really very lovely. What was also nice was that the staff member came over and gave us each a Vault City Brewing glass, which was handy as I needed a new beer glass, although it meant that we had to navigate around Cambridge all day with a glass each [as a spoiler, Nathan and I did both get our glasses back to Norwich safely].
I very much liked this venue and they had numerous customers coming in when we were there who purchased boxes full of different cans, and it’s fair to say that they weren’t priced like Morrison’s flog off their Stella. Some considerable effort has gone into sourcing beers that are actually very good, which isn’t the easiest thing to do and often isn’t done at all by pubs. There were some very tempting options in the fridges, particularly the sours and the stouts, but I managed to resist the temptation, not least as I already had a glass to traipse around all day, let alone beer.
Definitely one my my favourite pubs in Cambridge and one I’d happily recommend. Quirky, on trend and free from generic beers. As a controversial aside though, the beer range here is one of the best in the city, but I suspect that it will never get listed in the Good Beer Guide due to the lack of real ale…..
